The Mormon Trail Handcart Pioneers

Tell My Story Too -  by Jolene Allphin

Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began their part of the great westward expansion of the United States in 1846 when Brigham Young led a group of Latter-day Saints out of Nauvoo, Illinois, to escape religious persecution. The last 1,000 miles of the overland journey to the Great Salt Lake Valley began from the Saints' winter quarters on the Missouri River in 1847.

Between 1856 and 1860, ten Latter-day Saint pioneer emigrating companies tugged handcarts alon this 1,300-mile trail. During the latter part of 1856, emigrants in the Willie and Martin handcart companies, and the Hodgett(s) and Hunt wagon companies, were caught in winter snows. This website is devoted to those who traveled during that challenging time, as well as their heroic rescuers.

Article By Andrew D. Olsen and Jolene S. Allphin In Mormon Historical Studies Journal

Rock Creek Hollow has long been recognized as the site of the Willie handcart company’s camp and mass grave after they crossed Rocky Ridge in a bitter winter storm on October 23, 1856. In 1933, leaders and members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints built and dedicated a monument at Rock Creek Hollow, marking it as the burial place of the fifteen members of the Willie company who died from that crucible. In 1994, Gordon B. Hinckley of the Church’s First Presidency again dedicated the Rock Creek Hollow site (see page 11).

In the 1990s, some researchers began expressing the opinion that the historical sources either might not or do not support Rock Creek Hollow as the site of the Willie company’s camp and grave - see pages 12–13. These researchers submit that the site was instead four miles beyond Rock Creek Hollow, near the confluence of Willow Creek and the Sweetwater River. The alternate site is also four miles off the emigrant trail. This article examines the interpretations that place the Willie company's camp and grave at both of these locations.

Free Download - Rock Creek Hollow Studies - 80 pages.

Go to Rock Creek Hollow Articles.

This article is posted with permission from the Ensign Peak Foundation (formerly Mormon Historic Sites Foundation) and Latter-day Saint Historical Studies (formerly Mormon Historical Studies).

Cover art for this issue is Redick Allred in Stationed at South Pass. Courtesy Julie Rogers.